To get a feel for this conference I need you to close your eyes and picture 1000 worship leaders, musicians, and vocalist taken off of their stages, stages that sometimes become a burden and hindrance to worship, and placed into the congregation. They no longer have to worry about tuning guitars, mic batteries, or that last minute singer that attained the stomach flu last night. To these attendees the chord charts do not matter, the sound system does not matter, the slide show does not matter. For the next 2 and a half hours the only thing they have to do is focus on the majesty of God, and the exaltation of Christ, and they are in a place that gives them complete freedom to do so. “Come Christians Join and Sing” begins and all 1000 men and women stand to their feet to do just that. Join and sing praises to the Father, and clapping on a crisp to and four. To see a group of people excited about the doctrinal lyrics of a song is refreshing.
It was a tremendous start to the conference. Bob Kauflin and Covenant Life Church is a very humble and gracious host. I did discover that Josh Harris is much smaller than I pictured, but that is really not relevant to this post. The facility is great, and the sanctuary is one of the nicest I have ever been in. I appreciate so much the ministry of Sovereign Grace Ministries and their focus on writing songs for the church that exalt Christ and the cross. That is what we did tonight. We focused on the presence of God and did so by exalting Christ our Mediator.
The theme for the week is “God’s Presence” and Jeff Purswell, Dean of the Pastors College at Sovereign Grace, started the week off with a message that shows us Gods desire to dwell among His people. He did so by taking us through the bible and looking at the five images God has used to dwell among us. It was convicting to be reminded that our Sunday gatherings are about the presence of God, not just a gathering of random people from the community. The one thing that separates us from the world is that we have the spirit of God dwelling in us as a people. This is the way God has chosen to dwell among us today. I am sure Tim Challies will have a more detailed outline. (by the way Tim I would like to say hey this week, so look me up if you get a chance)
Tomorrow begins with “Jesus: Our Access Into God’s Presence” I will keep you up with the that later. And for all of the preachers that are wondering if we sang for 2 hours and heard a message for 30 minutes that answer is no. We sang about 45 minutes and heard about and hour and 5 minute message that was biblical exposition.
About the Author
36 year old husband, father, pastor, singer, musician, reader, eater, rider, watcher,
What did you learn? Any new songs or aspects of theology? Was the music blended to any degree?
We did two older hymns, but all the songs we did, but one, could be considered a hymn. As far as new songs, we did 5 songs and I now have 4 new ones to do in out church. We are already doing number 5. The songs we did tonight are some of the best I have heard and I am sure it will only get better.
I don’t want to speak on the theology yet. The sermon had a tremdous practical application to me personally and I am trying to think through all its ramifications. There seems to be an underlying theme that stated might be “Exaltation of Christ is our cornerstone/access into the presence of God”, but that has not been specifically stated.